Interview - Inside The Situation Room: 9/11, Two Presidents and The Hunt for Bin Laden

Interview - Inside The Situation Room: 9/11, Two Presidents and The Hunt for Bin Laden

From Mo News by @mosheh / tentwentytwo

September 7, 2026 · 1h 35m

About this episode

Michael Morell shares his firsthand accounts of the events surrounding 9/11 and the hunt for Osama bin Laden.

What happened inside Air Force One as America came under attack—and inside the Situation Room a decade later as the U.S. closed in on Osama bin Laden? As we mark the 25th anniversary of 9/11, former CIA Deputy Director Michael Morell gives us hisfirsthand account of both defining moments and everything in between. Morell was President George W. Bush’s intelligence briefer on September 11th and later helped President Obama assess whether bin Laden was really hiding in Pakistan before the raid that killed him. Morell recounts what Bush was asking as Air Force One moved between secure locations, how he identified al-Qaeda as the likely perpetrator and why bin Laden was able to escape from Afghanistan. He also takes us inside the deliberations over the Abbottabad raid—including the warning he gave Obama about how uncertain the intelligence remained. The conversation examines the failures that preceded 9/11 and what the Clinton and Bush administrations could have done differently. Morell also addresses conspiracy theories about that day, why bin Laden would view himself as partly successful given the state of the world 25 years later, how 9/11 should be taught to a new generation, and…

People in this episode

Host: Mosheh Oinounou

Guest: Michael Morell

Topics covered

Keywords

Mentioned in this episode

Organizations: CIA, Air Force One, al-Qaeda

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